Dialysis company DaVita accused of giant Medicare fraud

Dialysis company accused of giant Medicare fraud
By Scott Bronstein and Drew Griffin,

...Dr. Alon Vainer, a medical director at dialysis clinics in Georgia, was discussing clinic procedures with one of the nurses, Daniel Barbir. The two men say they saw something they believed was very wrong: expensive medicine, and lots of it, was being tossed in the trash. And the clinic workers were being told to do it, the two men say...

The alleged waste was being carried out on a massive scale and, the nurse and the doctor said, they knew why almost immediately. They claim it was a way for their company, DaVita Inc., to defraud the government, overbill Medicare and Medicaid and make a fortune...

DaVita has grown in the past couple of years and now runs roughly 2,000 dialysis clinics across the country, which has added up to a $7 billion business. The dialysis empire is run by CEO Kent Thiry, who dresses like one of the Three Musketeers, has adopted a company slogan of 'One for all and all for one' and in company staff meetings leads his employees, who he calls villagers, in cheers of "DaVita!"

Thiry is reportedly paid an estimated $15 million a year, according to the Wall Street Journal, which has called him the best compensated CEO in Colorado.